I was looking to see if there was anywhere in the rules that described how someone could go about growing Deepweed. Now I know it is an awakened plant and should be a very rare substance, but I would think there has to be some way to replicate it. Home growth of Kelp and Seaweed in general would probably require specific equipment to ensure a constant flow of nutrient rich water. In addition specialized sun lamps would be required as well.

My plan was to come up with rules to produce it in small ammounts that would greatly prohibit its mass production, something so that it would make it not in companies best interest to try and grow on their own. This procedure would have to be taught to the character, or could be found in a book of some kind (something similar to The Pharmacopeia). I figured there would have to be two components to growing the plant - the first being able to actually simply grow the plant part. The second would be cultivating and growing the awakend portion.

In order to complete the first part, the character would have to pass an extended test with an interval of one hour that can be done once per day. The skill used in the test would be Horticulture, Farming, or something like that + Logic and the threshold would be 3.

At the end of each days extended test, the grower would have to summon a Plant Spirit to imbue the plant with mana and astral energy. In order to do so the Plant Spirit must pass a test using only its force with each success imbueing one dose with energy.

The character can only attempt the test once per day, and the total number of hits should be totalled once a week to see how much plant can be harvested that week.

If no doses are generated for a week, the plant dies and a new one has to be harvested and grown from scratch. In addition a glitch on either the part of the spirit or the growth prevents all possible growth for that day. A critical glitch would kill the plant.

So what do you think?

Deepweed isn't a single plant, but a combination of several Awakened plants. You could theoretically grow the constituents.

Ok so lets say the above tests cover growing all of the different components, similar to how an extended repair test for a vehicle covers fixing multiple problems. Does it look reasonable?

Hmm... the description says it's 'derived from a form of awakened kelp'... not sure if that would fall under a compound or not.

If it is a compound, then I think it would fall under the Magical Compounds rules on pg. 88 of Street Magic. Would involve the Enchanting (Alchemy) skill... an Enchanting + Magic (4) Test once per month, with success resulting in 1 dose of the compound.

If it's not a compound, and instead just a 'prepared' form of Awakened Kelp that's prepared as a drug, then I'd say take a look at Gathering (pg. 80 Street Magic). The only problem I see there is this sentence "Herbal reagents come from the kingdom of plants and fungi, and must be harvested from the wild, never cultivated."

But my question to that would be, is this plant considered a reagent, or just an awakened plant (and is there a difference)?

I would say there is definitely a difference between a reagent and an awakened plant. A reagent would be something specific required in a spell formula, like dragons blood or mistletoe harvested with a golden sickle on a moonless night...something like that. Awakened plants are much more common. Magical compounds are much much more potent than Deepweed. So I'm not sure exactly where it would fall, if at all under each.

If I was hard pressed to put it into a catagory than I would say that reagent is the one. Therefore it would make its cultivation impossible.

BUT

Perhaps a forumula or plant could be cultivated to placate the additiction to Deepweed, kinda like methadone to a heroin addict. Not the real stuff, but close enough to keep the demons at bay? Not sure.

Deepweed is an Awakened drug, not a magical compound as in previous editions.

"Also known as “bad karma,� this substance is derived by Caribbean houngans from an Awakened form of kelp."

Ok so basically someone out there is harvesting the kelp, doing something to it, and then making Deepweed. I guess the ultimate question is whether or not the Awakened kelp can survive outside the ocean. If it can, then someone would only need to know what the houngans are doing to it to make deepweed.

As an aside, the question as to why corporations can't grow this I think falls into the whole essence debate. Essence, magic, etc. are happy-bunny hippy concepts (as portrayed in Shadowrun). If you get an ooky piece of cyberware, regardless as to how it connects to your brain, how it imbalances the chemicals in our body, etc., it reduces magic and essence, just as though you'd taken drugs or worked in a cube farm.

I would wager that magical drugs are similar. They are very sensitive to their environment, and anything which would reduce essence would reduce their potency. So they can't be fed processed fertilizer, they can't be grown in a factory, etc. Rather, they need to be close to other plants, need to be fed natural food and do best with natural sunlight because, hey, that's what magic seems to run on in this world.

Exactly along the lines I was thinking, hence the summoning of the Plant Spirit to impart that "natural" stuff to the plant. But the spirit can only supply so much, and it does not lend itself at all to mass production making it much more cost effective to simply farm it in the Carribean or buy on the street. But if you have the ability to summon spirits, know a bunch about plants, and have a raging addition to deepweed it might be worth your while to try to grow it on your own.

So maybe instead of summoning the Plant Spirit after making the horticulture, botony, farming whatever roll, maybe they should be summoned before and assist for the entire hour.

here is another idea for you. Give the players an opportunity to enter into a pact with a free plant spirit with the wealth power. Creating the Growing apparatus could be part of the 'offering'. Use with the 'wealth' created the flavor of the magical goodness you need to make the kelp special. Now, the characters are doing a lot more than just getting the wealth power used on there behalves, so I think it would be far count what they pull out of the tank '1/2 in components' you generally need for crafting. If you assume the spirit has magic 6 edge 6 you are looking at wealth of about 40k/month crafted to 80k. That's a fat stack of loot. It is also perfectly fair to say that the spirit is working with many people, and only uses the power for them ever X months, where x = a level of income you are ok with handing out.

I like this system because it introduces a character the players need to keep happy rather than just a threshold they need to hit. It also keep magic magic, while allowing it to interact with tech. Besides any one playing a mage should jump at the chance to pure over wonderous glowy aquariums full of bottom lite goodness. And you get directly control over how much they can pull from the system

While that would be great, I am actually the player and not the GM so I am trying to figure out a way that this can be done without having to rely on outside help.

Here we go...


So... THC, nicotine, and the ability to perceive.

Since you're asking if you can grow it for the 'addiction' flaw (and not to earn cash), I'd say that you could hold off addiction modifiers with cigarettes and some sort of canibus derivative (pot, hash, whatever). Much cheaper than the supposed $400/day deepweed habit.

As for rules, screw it... just wing it. I've never been rules heavy myself, if it advances the story.

Under the SR3 rules for making drugs, it is considered a compound, but I can't see much more than 'dry it, then ingest it' being involved. So a botany test once per week (or month) to generate X number of 'doses'... and if you sell it, the triad comes and breaks your legs.

Ok. So is Botany an active or knowledge skill?

[edit] I do show that it was a knowledge skill in previous additions, but there appears to be an active component to the skill as well.

[edit to the edit] Ok, I can see Botany as being the knowledge skill, and horticulture being the technical active skill of growing plants.

Botany - The science or study of plants
Horticulture - The science or art of cultivating fruits, vegetables, flowers, or ornamental plants.

i think i red about this in an issue of Red Eye once...

but seriously, i think anybody with the sufficient aquaculture resources (sounds a lot harder than a rigged up hydro system from old bottles and pvc pipe and what not) *could* grow deepweed. i mean, it's awakened, you don't have to do any work to make it magical (although i've heard that it doesn't hurt to treat your closet-grow plants/mushrooms nicely *wink*nudge*)

old aquaculture tanks in the basement of the arc (ACHE) could probably be used for this... who knows what's going on down there these days! also, (off the coast of) BC bud, etc etc...

i doubt the issue is really that it takes much precision to grow, as much as it is that kelp, being a plant that grows underwater, is a lot harder to cultivate just anywhere like hemp is (it's not called a "weed" because it needs to be taken care of)